From topography to hydrology-The modifiable area unit problem impacts freshwater species distribution models.

ABSTRACT: Species distribution models (SDMs) are statistical tools to identify potentially suitable habitats for species. For SDMs in river ecosystems, species occurrences and predictor data are often aggregated across subcatchments that serve as modeling units. The level of aggregation (i.e., model resolution) influences the statistical relationships between species occurrences and environmental predictors-a phenomenon known as the modifiable area unit problem (MAUP), making model outputs directly contingent on the model resolution. Here, we test how model performance, predictor importance, and the spatial congruence of species predictions depend on the model resolution (i.e., average subcatchment size) of SDMs. We modeled the potential habitat suitability of 50 native fish species in the upper Dan

SUBMITTER: Friedrichs-Manthey M 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC7083667 | biostudies-literature | 2020 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature